The Norfolk Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), in partnership with the Chrysler Museum of Art, will hold a free training event to educate the community about the FBI’s history, priorities, and ways corrupt practices are investigated.

A Norman Rockwell painting stolen more than 40 years ago has been recovered, announced Michael Harpster, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Philadelphia Division, and Timothy Carpenter, supervisory special agent with the FBI’s Art Crime Team.

FBI Special Agent in Charge Michael McGarrity of the New York Field Office presented representatives of the Max and Iris Stern Foundation, to include beneficiary Concordia University, the painting Young Man As Bacchus by Jan Franse Verzijl (1599-1647) in a ceremony at the Museum of Jewish Heritage.

FBI Special Agent in Charge Michael McGarrity of the New York Field Office and Joon H. Kim, Deputy U. S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, formally presented the Torlonia Peplophoros statue to Generale di Brigata Fabrizio Parrulli of Italy’s Carabinieri in a ceremony today at the New York Historical Society Library.

The FBI Art Crime Team and the Cherry Hill Police Department are seeking the public’s assistance in locating a stolen Norman Rockwell painting on the 40th anniversary of its theft.
It was one of several items taken from a Cherry Hill, New Jersey home in a June 30, 1976 break-in.

An 1875 handwritten letter by Charles Darwin that was stolen from the Smithsonian Institution Archives more than three decades ago was recovered by special agents on the FBI's Art Crime Team and returned to the care of the Smithsonian.

Special agents from the FBI returned a recovered Charles Darwin letter to the Smithsonian Institution Archives, the FBI Washington Field Office announced. The letter, penned by the renowned naturalist and geologist in 1875, was stolen from the Smithsonian more than three decades ago.

Preet Bharara, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Diego Rodriguez, the Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced today the filing of a civil forfeiture complaint against a Roman marble peplophoros statue (the “Torlonia Peplophoros”) stolen from the Villa Torlonia in Rome in 1983.
The Torlonia Peplophoros had been sold in Manhattan in 2001 after being unlawfully brought into the United States in the late 1990s.

Preet Bharara, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Diego Rodriguez, the Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced the arrest of ERIC IAN HORNAK SPOUTZ, a/k/a “Robert Chad Smith,” a/k/a “John Goodman,” a/k/a “James Sinclair,” on charges of wire fraud in connection with the sale of dozens of forged artworks by renowned American artists, such as Willem De Kooning, Franz…

A Chilean tapestry, the Bark Washington painting, and the Ames Stradivarius violin were returned to their rightful owners following the investigative work and partnerships of the FBI’s New York Art Crime Team.

The FBI is alerting art collectors and dealers to be particularly careful trading Near Eastern antiquities, warning that artifacts plundered by terrorist organizations such as ISIL are entering the marketplace.

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Diego Rodriguez, Assistant Director-in-Charge New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced today the return of a 1734 Stradivarius violin to the heirs of deceased violinist Roman Totenberg today at a ceremony at the United States Attorney’s Office in Manhattan. The violin was stolen from Mr.

BOSTON—Twenty-five years after the notorious burglary of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, law enforcement officials are seeking the public’s assistance in identifying an unauthorized visitor to the museum the night before the theft. That person entered the museum through the same door as the thieves in the middle of the night, 24 hours before the theft.

Richard Zabel, the Deputy United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Diego Rodriguez, Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced today the return of two antique books that were stolen from the National Library of Sweden in the 1990s. Deputy U.

SAN FRANCISCO—A federal jury convicted Luke D.
Brugnara today of mail fraud, wire fraud, false declarations to a court, escape, and contempt of court, announced United States Attorney Melinda Haag, Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agent in Charge David Johnson and U.

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that JAMES MEYER, a former assistant to artist Jasper Johns, was sentenced in Manhattan federal court to 18 months in prison for his role the sale of 37 works that MEYER stole from Johns’s studio in Sharon, Connecticut. MEYER pled guilty on August 27, 2014, to one count of interstate transportation of stolen goods.

Richard Zabel, the Deputy United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Diego Rodriguez, Assistant Director in Charge New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced today the return to the Italian Government of two pieces of Italian cultural heritage—“The Holy Trinity Appearing to Saint Clement,” attributed to the 18th Century painter Giambattista Tiepolo (the “Tiepolo”), and an ancient Etruscan bronze statuette of Herakles dating from the 6th or 5th Century B…

Bonnie Magness-Gardiner, manager of the FBI's Art Theft Program, discusses art theft, the National Stolen Art File, and the Art Crime Team, which was formed in 2005 to investigate thefts of art and cultural artifacts.

When a 300-year-old Stradivarius violin was stolen in Milwaukee last year, investigators initially believed the theft may have been the work of sophisticated art thieves. The truth turned out to be much less glamorous.

Deirdre M.
Daly, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that DAVID J.
CRESPO, 60, of Guilford, was sentenced today by Senior U.
S.
District Judge Ellen Bree Burns in New Haven to 57 months of imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release, for selling fraudulent artwork.

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and George Venizelos, the Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced today that JOHN RE, 54, of East Hampton, New York, pled guilty to one count of wire fraud in connection with his nine-year scheme to defraud art collectors who sought to acquire works by famous American artists such as Jackson Pollock and Willem De Kooning, which resulted in…

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that BRIAN RAMNARINE was sentenced in Manhattan federal court to 30 months in prison for fraudulently selling and attempting to sell, for more than $11 million, bronze sculptures that he falsely represented to be works of art by prominent artists Jasper Johns, Robert Indiana, and Saint Clair Cemin. RAMNARINE pled guilty in January 2014, on the fifth day of trial, before U.

LOS ANGELES—The owner of a Temecula art gallery who stalked, harassed and attempted to extort as much as $300,000 from art world professionals was sentenced today to 60 months in federal prison.
Jason White, 43, of Temecula, who pleaded guilty in March to two counts of federal stalking, was sentenced today by United States District Judge Stephen V.

The following remarks were prepared for delivery by FBI New York’s Assistant Director in Charge George Venizelos of the repatriation of stolen Peruvian paintings. Throughout time, most art has been created for a specific reason or purpose.

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and George Venizelos, Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced today the repatriation of nine stolen 18th century paintings to the Republic of Peru. Miguel Cabrera was an 18th century Mexican painter.

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that JAMES MEYER, a former assistant to artist Jasper Johns, pled guilty in Manhattan federal court in connection with his sale of 22 works that he stole from Johns’ studio in Sharon, Connecticut. MEYER pled guilty today before U.

OAKLAND, CA—Andre Taray Franklin was sentenced yesterday to four years in prison for knowingly receiving and then selling a historic gold jewelry box stolen from the Oakland Museum of California, announced United States Attorney Melinda Haag and FBI Special Agent in Charge David J.
Johnson.

The FBI—along with Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts—asked for the public’s help in recovering artwork stolen from the museum more than two decades ago in what remains the largest property crime in U.S. history.

Terracotta plaques and other artifacts seized during a 2006 investigation were returned to the government of Iraq in a Washington, D.C. ceremony that celebrated a successful law enforcement operation and the cultural significance of antiquities that are thousands of years old.